Thermaco Blog

In the three decades since Thermaco developed the innovative Big Dipper grease interceptor, more than 33,000 units have been installed in commercial kitchens around the world.

Thermaco is also focused on continuing to innovate, and we’re proud to announce the new and improved 40000 Series Big Dipper with digital control. We know a food service establisment's priorities for a grease interceptor are simple: efficient operation, minimal maintenance, and compliance.

The 40000 Series Big Dipper with a new digital control unit is designed to help accomplish all those goals.

You make sure your fire extinguishers and other safety gear is regularly inspected.

And if something goes wrong with a piece of equipment, you immediately call a service technician and get it fixed.

While you may think you’re doing everything you could, and everything you should, to keep your commercial kitchen in compliance with government regulations, there are still a few surprises that could trip you up.

Whether it’s a small, neighborhood pizza place or a large, institutional cafeteria that runs 24/7, installing the correctly sized grease trap is critical.

Install a unit that’s too small, and you risk overflows and messy back-ups in the kitchen. Install a unit (or units) that are too large, though, and you’ll end up with a different kind of waste – money flushed down the drain.

However, the methods used in many plumbing codes to estimate grease trap size requirements tend to overestimate peak flow, and therefore can overestimate the unit capacity needed.

Why we redesigned the Thermaco website

We built Thermaco on innovation — the idea that we could figure out a way to manage fats, oil and grease from commercial kitchens better than the industry had before.

So when we decided this year that it was time to give our website a facelift, we took the same innovation-first approach. Though we wanted to update the look and feel of the site, we also wanted the site to be a better resource for customers and others seeking information.

Changing demographics and lifestyles are producing greater strains on water treatment systems and could threaten water quality. Surprised? It’s true. And we’re not just talking about the strain of a growing population.

Since the 1970s, the amount of food consumed at restaurants or purchased from take-out spots has increased dramatically. And with that, comes more commercial kitchen wastewater entering the sewers.

A 2006 USDA study, for example, found that from the 1970s to the 1990s, the percent of daily calories from meals purchased away from home increased from 18 percent to 32 percent. And from 1974 to 2004, away-from-home spending grew from 34 percent of total food dollars to about half of all food expenditures.

If you’re about to purchase a new grease trap you need to consider more than just the initial cost of the unit.

Like any piece of industrial equipment, grease traps have costs that go far beyond the initial capital cost. In fact, over a period of many years, capital costs are likely to make up just a small percentage of the total cost of ownership for a grease interceptor.

Grease trap and grease interceptor costs fall into three categories:

Initial purchase cost

Initial purchase costs will depend on several factors, including how large a unit you need, whether you need multiple units and the type you choose.

ASHEBORO, N.C. — Water runs from our taps, and we store it in bottles, coolers and refrigerators.

Clean, cool and crisp. We take it for granted.

Much of the world isn’t so fortunate.

While the world population has tripled in the 20th century, the use of renewable water resources has grown six-fold according to water.org, which works to promote clean water sources throughout the world.

Thermaco, a leader in the highly specialized field of oil and grease extraction from wastewater, considers this to be an important part of its mission.

“Thermaco strives to make relevant products for water pretreatment that enable food service providers to be better stewards of the sewer collection systems of which they are a part,” says Yaralitza A. Erives, Director of Customer Service and Sales at Thermaco.

Singapore –- the East Asian city-state –- is known worldwide as a leader in urban cleanliness and environmental stewardship. Visitors to Singapore discover a bustling multicultural metropolis where towering skyscrapers soar above charming British colonial architectural, and where an abundance of tourist sites, glamorous shopping centers, and food courts buzz with activity seven days a week. As one of the world’s most densely populated metropolitan areas, both the government and citizens of Singapore are proud of the nation’s leadership in urban efficiency, quality of life, and environmentalism.

Keep Soapy flows from Contacting Downstream Fats and Oils (Lipids)

A commercial dishwasher’s output is hot, soapy water and is ALWAYS running richer than needed in terms of detergent chemicals. Why? Because it is a far lesser evil to send unused detergent (high in BOD) with sanitizers (chlorides) and water softening agents (a variety of mineral grabbing stuff so as to leave no spots on the washed ware) THAN to have a potential sanitary hazard imposed on the community’s dining customers, i.e. dirty dishes. Sending a commercial dishwasher’s output through the kitchen’s drainage plumbing emulsifies any and all fats or oils in its route, including the retained grease and oils in a conventional downstream grease separator. Notice the wording “conventional”. Anytime a warm (usually no longer hot by that time) soapy flow enters a conventional (think traditional inlet and outlet configuration), it rises “lava lamp” style and displaces the cold water already in the separator. As the cold water layer falls, it tugs on the underside of the trapped grease mat, adding some gentle mixing action.

Better Practices in the Modern Era

We are thankful to live in the 21st century and to not worry about dying from a restaurant dining experience. I once worked with a man whose 20 year-old brother died in 1940 of food poisoning from a restaurant with poor sanitation. As recently as the late 1940s, hot water heaters were not reliable and ware-washing detergents were caustic based. If the water was not hot, the detergent was not effective. Today’s modern restaurant has plenty of hot water, highly efficient detergents and those detergents also contain sanitizers and water softening agents to ensure complete sanitation and cleaning takes place.

Today we have better sanitation practices and the plates are always clean, but how about what is being sent down the drain? Does it pose a problem for the community’s sewer collection system? Can the constituents be treated at the community’s wastewater treatment plant?